Training director;

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Practice office
training directors
are responsible,
under the
direction of
partners in
charge, for
planning and
implem en ting
appropriate
training programs
for their offices.
H&S Training
Directors Manual
H&Taskins & Sells is in the education
business. Since the Firm's reason
for existence is to supply the highest
level of expert professional services to
our clients, the education of our professional staff is
understandably a major internal concern. And, as
the accounting profession grows more complex in
the years ahead, the educational functions within
H&S will become increasingly vital to the overall
operations of our practice.
The educational effort of the Firm falls into three
primary categories:
The core program—Basic courses the Firm
believes should be taken by every new member of
our professional staff. The Continuing Education
Department, however, points out that the core
program should be supplemented by elective
courses and special training. Intensive tax training
for those who decide early in their career to
specialize in taxation would be a good example of
the latter.
Elective courses—Haskins & Sells offers a large
variety of elective courses intended to round out
the Firm's programs at various career-year levels.
National and regional meetings—Meetings and
seminars covering a broad spectrum of educational
and instructional topics are held annually for
everyone from the newest staff member to
partners. Nor is the training director forgotten.
Continuing Education Department holds an
annual meeting for training directors to keep them
informed as to what CE is doing to improve the
training program and to receive in turn the ideas,
suggestions and comments of the training
directors. (A summary of the H&S continuing
education program is included as a separate folder
within the Firm's recruitment brochure.) H*ow do the training directors see
their own function? At the 1975
Training Directors Seminar, those
attending were asked to list in order
of importance their training goals. The first five
listed were: to generate staff interest; to have a
well-trained staff; to guide technical development;
to expand awareness; and to prepare staff to
develop others.
As presently structured, direction of the Firm's
training program is supervised by the Executive
Office Continuing Education Department under
partner Don McLellan. It is the responsibility of the
training director to achieve the goals and objectives
of the program, within the prescribed structure,
while taking into account the specific needs of the
people in his office.
^KFW/F ^P'ho and what is the training
H J n ^^director? He is usually a member
ByPf«y of management. He often has a
Wr background in teaching within the
Firm and outside. He frequently has volunteered to
take on the duties of a training director. He is adept
at planning year-long training schedules for
everyone from partners to first-year staff
accountants while taking into account a complex
array of limiting factors ranging from client
commitments, holidays and Firm meetings to
vacations, office functions and anticipated special
work.
Frank Barfuss, partner with our New Haven
office and a man with long experience in training,
summed up the function of the training director
most succinctly: "The role of the training director is
to assess the staff and job requirements and then
to decide what training the staff needs and see that
they get it."
Frank, involved in the New York practice office
training program for seven years before
transferring to New Haven where he has been
training director for four years, emphasized that
the size of a practice office affects the practical
elements of training rather than the overall goals.
In New Haven, for example, the staff is broken
down into five groups according to the individual's
length of time with H&S. "We schedule most of our
training in the May-through-June and September-through-
October periods, since this avoids any
conflicts with such obviously bad times as our
busy season and vacations," Frank said. "And after
surveying our needs, we've instituted a booster
program of catch-up courses in a number of areas,
such as SEC work and computer applications. In
addition, at least twice a year we give our people
updates on what we feel are important recent
developments in different areas of the accounting
profession."
But if the timing and the content of the courses
are important, so, too, is making sure that everyone
gets the training schedule well in advance. "Our
schedule for a calendar year is usually published
the preceding November," Frank said, "so our
people have sufficient time to study it.
"The size of our office permits us to limit study
groups to from five to ten persons each, and most oi
our material is from the EO Continuing Education
Department with some modification or
supplementation to meet any particular needs we
might have. In New Haven, everyone gets a piece
of the action: we use mostly our staff people for
instructors. One obvious advantage is that it
For the professional accountant, education is a life-long process.
With the CPA being called upon to perform an increasingly vital service to the American
business community in a rapidly changing environment, the need for a broad continuing
education program becomes more important. This is a fact long recognized by Haskins & Sells,
which provides just such a broad-based educational program for all its professionals,
from the first-year accountant to the partnership lejel.^ key role in this program is played
practice office who is known as the M^ClXlttXlfoCt U X I T C C t O IT
by the individual in each H&S
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